| |
Womens Interests > A Time To Wean
1
Reviews [ add review ],
Article rating : 0.00, 0 votes. Author : Jennifer Sprague
Women in the United States today receive conflicting advice on many aspects of nursing, but especially where weaning is concerned. I am writing this now, because it has become a continuing issue for my son and I. He’ll be two in a week, and he is still nursing. Just today I was told I was “crazy” and “borderline insane” for continuing to nurse. I was also told by a very dear friend that “continuing to breastfeed a child who is almost 2 years old is not natural.”
So first let me provide some facts from the health authorities:
·The American Academy of Pediatricians guidelines recommend mothers breastfeed for at least the first twelve months of life and as long after as is mutually desired.
·The World Health Organization and UNICEF- recommend mothers breastfeeding for two years or longer.
However, despite these guidelines many physicians today consider six months to be “extended” breastfeeding, with some health professionals questioning the motives of women who nurse for more than a year. In turn, women may feel they have to hide the fact that they are still nursing an older child from disapproving health care professionals or family members. I know that we personally have done just that. Many of the doctors in our practice do not know that we are still breastfeeding. They don’t know about our co-sleeping or about our non-vaxing either. (We’ll save these topics for upcoming articles).
From anthropological research, we know that in many non-Western cultures children are routinely nursed for three to four years. Are they wrong or are we? Can and should we look to other animals to determine what the “natural” age of weaning should be in today’s world if it was not modified by cultural beliefs and stigmas?
In my research I have looked at the various “life-history” variables (such as length of gestation, birth weight, growth rate, age at sexual maturity, age at eruption of teeth, and life span) in non-human primates. I also looked at how these variables correlate with age of weaning in these animals. With these mammals being our closest relatives in the animal kingdom, they are especially important to study in order to better understand ourselves in all aspects, not just nursing. Gorillas and chimpanzees share more than 98% of the same genes with humans. Armed with facts regarding these creatures, I came up with a number of predictions for when humans would “naturally” wean their children if cultural pressures and opinions didn’t influence them.
This interest stemmed from a reading of the cross-cultural literature on age at weaning. Clearly, all cultures have very different beliefs about when children should be weaned, from very early in the United States to very late in some other countries. One often hears that the worldwide average age of weaning is 4.2 years; however this figure is neither accurate nor meaningful. A survey of 64 “traditional” studies done prior to the 1940’s showed a median duration of breastfeeding is about 2.8 years, however, some society’s breastfeed for much shorter periods of time, and some breastfeed for much longer periods of time. It is meaningless, statistically, to speak of an average age of weaning worldwide.
Why do I say these studies were meaningless? Just think of the static’s not taken into account like, how many children never nurse at all. Some mothers give up in the first few days, or at six weeks when they go back to work. It is true however, that there are still many societies in the world where children are routinely breastfed until the age of four or five years, or older. Even in the United States, some children are nursed this long or longer. (Most of the time, this is done in secret as the mothers are afraid of the public backlash and humiliation they might receive). In societies where children are allowed to nurse as long as they want, they will typically self-wean, with no arguments or emotional trauma, at or around the ages of 3 or 4.
Did you know that many animals have natural ages of weaning? It’s around 8 weeks for dogs and 8-12 months for horses. These animals obviously don’t have cultural beliefs about when to wean, they just do what comes naturally.
Some of the results from my research are as follows:
·In a group of 21 species of non-human primates (monkeys and apes) studied by Holly Smith, it was found that the offspring or babies were weaned at the same time they were getting their first permanent molars. That would be between 5.5 and 6.0 years for humans.
·Pediatricians claim that the length of gestation is approximately equal to the length of nursing in many species. This would suggest a weaning age of 9 months for humans.
However, this relationship turns out to be affected by how large the adult animals are when born. Meaning; the larger the adults, the longer the length of breastfeeding relative to gestation. For chimpanzees and gorillas, the two primates closest genetically and in size to humans, the relationship is 6 to 1. That is to say, they nurse their offspring for SIX times the length of gestation (actually 6.1 for chimps and 6.4 for gorillas, with human’s mid-way in size between these two.) In humans, that would be equal to somewhere around 4.5 years of nursing (six times the 9 months of gestation).
·Several pediatricians also claim that most mammals wean their offspring when they have tripled their birth weight, where-by suggesting a weaning age of 1 year in humans. Again though, this is affected by body weight, with larger mammals nursing their offspring until they have quadrupled their birth weight. In humans, quadrupling of birth weight usually occurs between 2.5 and 3.5 years of age.
·One study of primates showed that the offspring were weaned when they had reached about 1/3 of their adult weight. This happens in humans at about 5-7 years.
·A comparison of weaning age and sexual maturity in non-human primates suggests a weaning age of somewhere between 6 and 7 for humans (about half-way to reproductive maturity.
·Studies have shown that a child’s immune system doesn’t completely mature until about 6 years of age, and it is a well established fact that breast milk helps develop the immune system and augment it with maternal antibodies as long as breast milk is produced, up to two years. (No studies have been done on breast milk composition after two years post partum).
And the list goes on and on. The minimum predicted age for natural weaning in humans is somewhere around 2.5 years, with a maximum of 7.0 years.
In terms of the benefits of extended breastfeeding, there have been a number of studies comparing breastfed and bottle-fed babies. When you think about it in terms of the frequency of various diseases, and IQ achievement, in every case, the breastfed babies had a lower risk of ALL disease and higher IQs than their bottle-fed counterparts. In the studies that divided breastfed babies into categories based on length of breastfeeding, the babies’ breastfed the longest did better in terms of both lower disease and higher IQ. So in other words, if the categories were 0-6 months of breastfeeding, 6-12 months, 12-18 months and 18-24+ months, the 18-24+ month group of babies did the best, and then 12-18 month babies did the next best, and so forth. However, no matter how long the nursing relationship was, in the end the studies showed that the breastfed baby had much higher IQ scores and lower illnesses than those that were bottle-fed. This has also been proven and shown for gastrointestinal illness, upper respiratory illness, multiple sclerosis, diabetes, and heart disease. It’s important to note that none of these studies looked at children who had nursed longer than 2 years. Babies who nursed 18 months or longer were all lumped into one all encompassing category. Presumably, the benefits continue to accrue, as your body doesn’t know that your baby has had a birthday, and in turn suddenly started producing nutritionally and immunological worthless milk.
So, no one has yet proven either way that the benefits of breastfeeding either continue or stop at the two-year mark, because the appropriate studies have not been done.
The trend during the first two years is clearly for continuing; even improving benefits the longer you nurse; so it would only seem reasonable to believe that that continues. Clearly the phenomenon of diminishing returns is at work here—the first six months of breastfeeding are clearly much more important in terms of the baby’s nutrition and immunological development than the six months from 3.5 to 4.0 years. That doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t continue to provide breast milk if your baby wants and you don’t mind.
Fortunately, babies born in the U.S. don’t have to contend with many of the diseases, parasites or contaminated water that babies in Third World countries do. We have more supplementary foods that we can generally trust to be safe and clean. We can get our children immunized (if we choose), and get them antibiotics for infections when necessary. The fact that we have access to these items does not at all mean that breastfeeding is unimportant. Breastfed babies still have a huge advantage over bottle-fed babies, even in a squeaky clean environment with wonderful medical care. They get sick less often, smarter, and happier. Another important consideration for the older child is that they are able to maintain their emotional attachment to a person, rather than being forced to switch to an inanimate object such as a teddy bear or blanket. I for one think these sets the stage for a life of people-orientation, rather than materialism, and that’s a good thing. I also can’t imagine living through those tough toddler years without that close loving connection to a mother that loves them. To a child going through enormous changes, some of which are very frustrating to the child; I believe breastfeeding can be the “saving-grace.”
In closing; breastfeeding is wonderful and beneficial, and can be provided by most mothers. It is unfortunate that people here in the United States are so behind in admitting that breastfeeding is best, and promoting it; even in its beginning form. Mothers shouldn’t feel they have to hide the fact that they’ve chosen to do what they believe is best for their children. I have been asked to leave places of business because I was breastfeeding my then 1 ½ year old son. Breastfeeding is a normal, natural part of parenting, which should be enjoyed by both mother and child; it is not something to be hidden or ashamed of.
I believe it’s time to educate the public on not only the importance of breastfeeding, but also the legalities surrounding it. Hopefully the more we help people understand the facts, the more accepting people will be.
Jennifer Sprague, co-owner of High Top Baby Designs. She has several years of teaching experience, working with infants through adults and has a passion for helping children live happy, healthy and secure lives. Jennifer has been a nanny, daycare provider, teacher, and is currently studying to become a Doula and a Lactation Consultant. She enjoys spending time with her two wonderful children, Aubrey and Zachary. Jennifer is also an advocate for peaceful parenting everywhere she goes.© 2005 High Top Baby Designs. All rights reserved
Article reviews
Posted by Susan Burger
This article is plagerized from Kathy Dettwyler's work. The plagerist should be ashamed of herself for stealing the work of a reknowned anthropologist and calling it her own.
Kathy Dettwyler has worked long and hard in the field and should be given full credit, not someone who clearly just lifted it off a website.
Post your review
[ Note : no HTML/URLs - will removed automatically ]
More articles from Womens Interests
|
